Please be advised that we do not tolerate spam

[m0rtal]

Hey guys please stop spamming my website url everywhere because I'm getting e-mail complaints such as the one below and I don't want to get in trouble. Thank you for your co-operation.

Hello,

On March 30th, a page that we administrate was vandalized by a user named *. This user posted a single article (URL: ), which contained a single link (). This blog article contained a link directing users to your webpage (URL: )

Please be advised that we do not tolerate spam or vandalism on our website and we will be forced to take additional measures if more spam directed towards your website is received.

Thank you.

Obviously I lol'd at that but I have a serious question now. I've always wondered why vandalism or some other laws don't hold up when it comes to spamming other sites (xrumer, blogs, wikis, etc)? Or do people just not bother because it's so difficult to prove who did it, time consuming and rampant, etc? Like if you go spamming shit on people's sites aren't you technically defacing their "property" and therefore be possibly charged with vandalism? Obviously it's hard to prove something like that but if you mess with the wrong person I can't imagine why it wouldn't be possible? Of course I get why it's not very feasible especially if shit is international and how for MOST people it's just better to hit the delete button but assuming you had a determined chap could it be done if someone could backtrace everything to you? Obviously cops don't give a fuck about nor do they have the resources for this kind of stuff but I'm talking about extremes and the law.

I mean you have the CAN-SPAM and that shit does actually hold up for mail so where does spamming shit on other websites fall under if anywhere?

Grr meant to put this in the traffic section, if a mod could move that would be delicious, thanks.

 

[medicalhumor]

The site owners are inviting users to post comments on their site by providing the ability to do so. If they don't want the spam, they can delete it or close commenting

 

[conv3rsion]

Basically the site owners are putting up a gigantic white board and inviting anyone to write on it. Thats a lot different than vandalism. If they don't like the content being posted they can:

A) Moderate their comments
B) Add capchas or other measures
C) Give only certain users the ability to post
D) Turn off commenting

Thats a lot different then unsolicited contact (email spam without an opt in, which is permitted once per person under can-spam), or vandalism, like graffiti on a wall that no one is supposed to write on. Now, spamming on sites like Facebook is different, because in order to do so you need a user account, and creating a user account binds you to their TOS, which coupled with the fact that they have a lot of money, means they can and will sue you for blatant abuses of their system.